Henry Normal is half of one of the most successful comedy factories in UK television, Baby Cow, home to Gavin and Stacey, The Mighty Boosh and Nighty Night. The other half? Steve Coogan.

A former co-writer on Caroline Aherne's The Royle Family, Normal founded Baby Cow with Coogan in 1999.

Henry Normal. Photograph: Rex Features
As well as becoming the home to various Coogan projects such as BBC2's Saxondale, Baby Cow has attracted and nurtured some of the country's brightest comedy talent - the likes of Rob Brydon, Julia Davis, Johnny Vegas and the Mighty Boosh's Julian Barratt and Noel Fielding.

But the company enjoyed its biggest hit to date with BBC3's award-winning sitcom Gavin and Stacey, written by and starring James Corden and Ruth Jones, another new entry on this year's MediaGuardian 100.

Jones said Normal had an "incredible mind for comedy. He sees how things should naturally go."

Normal has described comedy as "somewhere between mathematics and music". Baby Cow's numerous other credits include Marion and Geoff, Human Remains, the Keith Barrett Show and feature film A Cock and Bull Story.

As well as TV and film, the company moved into radio with BBC Radio 4 sci-fi comedy Nebulous, and helped create what was billed as the world's first daily online interactive sitcom, Where Are The Joneses?.

Why Baby Cow? The production company is named after another Coogan alter ego, Paul Calf.

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